I love making crepe paper curtains for birthdays and graduations. I hang the them over a bedroom doorway so the person gets a blast of "Happy Birthday" each time they walk through. My littlest little bit just had a birthday, and I found myself up late decorating.
I normally tape up each streamer individually, but this time I thought I would get smart and use the sewing machine. I was impressed with how fast it went, and also how sturdy the finished product was. It was much easier than standing on a chair for half an hour, juggling streamers, tape and scissors. And, the curtain can be used again at the next birthday, photo session, or Valentines Day! Here's a quick tutorial.
Crepe Streamer Curtain
Let me begin by saying that by the time I got to making this curtain, it was well past midnight. That's why all the pictures looked like they were taken in the dead of night-- because they were!
First, you'll need quite a few streamer strips. This is by far the most time consuming part of the process. It would go a lot faster with a helper. I made mine 6ft long because I wanted to make sure that the curtain would reach my daughter eye-height. If you are making this for an adult, you could get away with 3-4 feet long streamers.
Take one strip feed it into the machine as shown. Sew the long strips in horizontally. To keep the strips evenly spaced, I added a new strip when ever my needle went over the previous strip.
After that, it's just a matter of trimming the strips to even up any measuring/cutting/sewing errors.
All that's left is to get your camera ready for the surprise first thing in the morning!
This would be so cute in rainbow colors or red, pink and white for Valentines Day.